koz's infinite hopecore

he/him | 23 | hot take bakery | ao3

[facemerchant]

player agency

(8.5k, explicit)

“What did you say?” This isn’t the first time Lovro heard something like this.

Ivan readjusts his posture. A tiny strip of skin peeks from beneath his sweater.

“I said racing time.”

Ivan and Lovro schedule a video game date.

[facemerchant]

i am not dead and things are happening. there are 3.5 people left in the fandom but you have to do things for the love of the game. i promise the rest of this nonsense will lower your iq

[lachricola]

Sram S3 episode barcodes

I put the lines in where the clips begin/end.

you can find the tool here.

also @blorbotown for color reasons.

[lachricola]

Ok, I need to talk about this, because I have thoughts.

The fridge and the image of habit preservation and hiding secrets

Ok so... why is this fridge relevant? This one, like all fridges in households, is an everyday item for usage and it is therefore directly connected to daily habits, good and bad. What gets a place in the fridge tells a lot about the people living with it. It also is a clear symbol of family dynamics, with parents usually deciding what gets in there and feeding it to their children. It serves as a cache for your secrets, for your booze to be hidden and old rotting stuff to be forgot and preserved even longer. It's still there, but at least you don't see it. Out of sight out of (concious) mind. It remains order on the outside, despite the potential mess inside.

Episode 1

The first instance we see the fridge in S3 is in episode 1. It's a direct transition from Lovros room door opening to opening of the fridge. We don't see the full picture only zoomed in on the post-it with surely well-intended but annoying commands. "Take care of this", but dressed as maternal care. Lovro removes the post-it. We don't see whether he actually tries the cake. Probably not.

To Lovro, this fridge stuffed with cakes is a constant reminder of his mum's mental state. It gets preserved in the fridge, for him to eat. Which is, in of itself, heartbreaking. But a very clever take on the co-dependency.

Episode 7

This notion of course depends on who observes. For outsiders, the picture can be very different. Cake in the fridge ready to eat becomes a good thing somehow. Like Eva is getting the cake out of the fridge and puts it right in front of Nora and Lovro. Gets it in sight, even though it's probably the last thing Lovro wants to have.

Episode 8

In Episode 8, the fridge light seems to be even bluer and colder. And Lovro fetches a bowl with some sort of fruits. He looks at them, picks one, and then joins his mum in the living room. He also leaves the bowl with all the other ones on the kitchen counter.

But he does not eat it, he treats it more like a fidget to calm his nerves, to occupy his hands while being nervous.

Ok, call me crazy, but to me this bowl of fruits reads 1) as a metaphor for the secrets and family members and 2) has almost a biblical implication. He took it out of there, out in the open. There is no turning back now any more. He will finally face this conversation, despite being terrified. And him carrying this thing to the couch and holding it sort of aknowledges him being part of this family. At the same time, he separated this one fruit from the rest and did not bring the bowl with him. He clearly does feel separated and not ready to share everything. But he chose this one thing to bring to the table (the couch).

After the talk on the couch, when Ana wants to distance herself from the situation and her overwhelm with it, she goes into the kitchen. And does WHAT? She puts the exact bowl with the other fruits BACK in the fridge, while creating a barrier between her and Lovro. A displacement activity due to being overwhelmed, but also an act to restore order, to preserve the fruit/the family. If it were up to her, she would hide these feelings again.

But when she closes the door of the fridge, Lovro still has his single fruit in hands. He chose to expose himself, this secret and his feelings, finally breaking this cold barrier between them.

And when we move to the table and they share this intimate moment, we get warm light and the other fruits out in the open on the table. Ready to eat, ready to share, as the two were right now. Breaking the cycle finally.

[mooncafex]

to keep their eu membership i propose that every country make a skam remake and so far 7 out 27 have done it so what are the others waiting for chop chop

[yu-na-yu]

Maybe the reason I like Lovro's season so much is because he is a character who doesn't think he'll ever experience something properly romantic, stuck with an unrequited crush on his best friend, but then finds himself a guy who looks at him like he's hung the moon in the sky himself. Who did everything in his power to have Lovro look his way for even just a second

[mikanpeel]

Earlier today I was thinking about how grateful I am that we got to see kolacic's arguments...I think it's really important to have and now we've seen how each of them handles it, which wasn't that great tbh (Lovro constantly running away), but now that we've seen their relationship develop so so much I'm sure their arguing is bound to improve too

[facemerchant]

rewatching sram like everybody and their mother and this was CRAZY

[juliusbir]

i find it deeply ironic how in-fandom u see countless jokes of lovro being a diva, receiving princess treatment, looking visibly gay etc. and then the same audience asks What exactly lovro is afraid of.

[internet-xnopyt]

oh my god this is exactly, spot ON what i had in mind while the space was going on about lovro being the most alt and stereotypically queer-presenting of other isaks, and within sram dont mind me rehashing points that have been surely exhausted before- not an original thought to come- lovro is The quote unquote Blue Hair With Pronouns guy. his story was not told independent of his appearance. like of course there's always the even character who has the 'safety net' of being straight-passing whereas the isak character typically doesn't feel like they have that privilege, but lovro in particular begins the season nowhere near integrated into the straight act. even when he tries he doesn't do it very well. unlike the other isaks who have to mop away a haze of heteronormativity before they can peer through the glass into who they really are lovro has to do that WHILE being acutely aware that his appearance singles him out. in an environment so restrictive too.

and you're right, just like when Ivan was posting fourth wall breaks on instagram the Fandom is put into two pairs of shoes- Lovro's, and the world around him's! we were following the exact sentiments of the voices in his head that he is Different. the world will Never see him equally to others. he Cannot experience the world in the same way as his peers do. that realization- be it as a queer person, as a person of colour, as a woman- that the way you interact with society was determined for you by merit of preconceived notions of the group to which you belong, shakes the ground out from beneath you. you realize to some people you are not an individual. that is the core of all the isak characters' homophobia but Particularly with lovro.

a tiny appendix- it's 100% okay to joke around and make headcanons about characters and write indulgent fun fanfiction about them because that's what fandom is for- trying to eliminate that dichotomy is like you willingly signing up to help Sisyphus roll that boulder up a hill. but when we're talking about the shame show about shame about how the character experiences being gay, how the world views that character... and when the fandom almost BECOMES the world... hmmmm

i'm like 99.99999% sure there's been a wonderfully insightful post made about literally all of this somewhere out there but ok

[facemerchant]

adding to the reblog train here: when lovro is calling ivan during the strah clip @magickl0ve said, and i quote, “im very sorry for him but this is also how every woman feels outside after 9:00pm”. its dević for a reason isnt it

[facemerchant]

spent the last three days discussing sram on twitter space with friends and had a super lovely time! might as well share the slides here, seeing how graphic design is my passion

[mikanpeel]

For the sake of sparing everyone from reading 10000 words of pure glaze...I'm just going to quickly talk about things that sram has done that I really really like

1. Characterization/Character depth

Ivan is the most developed Even variant that I think we've gotten? (OooOoOOo controversy)

I really like how they set up his character in all the small ways

This moment for example is like: "So Ivan is the type of person to steal keys, and he was close enough with his teammates that they did this together"

There are so many more moments but I'm not going to yap about them all (maybe in a separate post?) overall, he doesn't feel like an accessory to Lovro and his story, that's important to me

Also with Vito, he isn't just gay guy™, he has his dating issues, gets petty when that argument with Lovro happens, and we get to find out how he exists and navigates being queer within their society

AND LOVRO'S RELATIONSHIP WITH HIS MOM, just Ana as a character in general. Every clip that she was in is so effective, and they build upon the themes that are woven into the show

This scene in particular. Yes, tell me all about the generational trauma!! Dysfunctional family dynamics in media really gets me foaming at the mouth

And how could I forget how sram utilised the Emma character? I believe they really did so well with all her clips, yes including the Ema-Ana meeting. All those scenes with her felt so suffocating, hopeless, and melancholic. It really captured the push-and-pull mind fuck that is internalised homophobia

2. Cinematography

I know jackshit about this tbh and all the smart people in the tag have talked about the visual storytelling, symbolism, and the colour coding. It just appealed to that rudimentary part of my brain: pretty colours pretty shots

That animated scene? The inclusion alone was one the most creative ideas and it made the most sense for their characters. I loved that

3. Themes!

There's so much to talk about here, because this season tackles quite a lot, and all of them connect to the overarching theme of shame

Mental health issues, homophobia, dysfunctional families, masculinity (that's such an oversimplification so please read what I linked)

4. Subtlety

Idk I just feel that sram trusts their audience to understand. They don't really spoon feed us, from what the characters are thinking, to what they're trying to communicate visually, etc etc

Also (I don't know if this belongs under this section but!) I feel like they understand how queer people in homophobic countries signal that queerness, e.g., how Ivan signals to Lovro his interest in him (so much room for plausible deniability just in case it all goes south)

5. Music

The songs they chose added so MUCH to the storytelling. Like it really assisted the narrative, and skam and the other remakes haven't really done it like this before. (Lowk the song choices in the og made me cringe so hard and some remakes had music playing after every second and it was so distracting) I've only really come to appreciate it because of some posts on here, and rewatching some clips

That is all...for now?

I'm pretty sure after my rewatch I'll have so much more to say about all of these. I wasn't really trying to be analytical here, these are just things I've noticed and enjoyed

I understand that people have their criticisms with the decisions made for the season, but personally, those didn't really bother me as much? They made sense to me narratively (e.g., a lot of the arguments that happened during ep. 8)

[facemerchant]

I have already read your fic multiple times, it is just too damn good. Thank you so much for writing it!! If you ever write anymore, please know that I will be first in line to read it - with a massive grin and a bucket of popcorn.

i may be a writer but my best response to this is like ouueueieoeueeiuuiewoewwewe 😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭

i have plenty of fics like that myself, so im super honored to fulfill that role for you anon <3 thank you!!!

[inlovewitheidea]

this is possible

[swissywiss]

watching the interview with jelena g is making me so happy because it really feels like she’s going about this the true way of the skam 😭 like yes follow the ancient texts this is amazing

[swissywiss]

[facemerchant]

so it turns out that sram did have the parallel universe talk after all. huh.

[facemerchant]

when i show up at the ball competition to find that all the balls have been stolen and juggled by @blorbotown

[blorbotown]

AFGDHJK so you did mean the pool + the cafeteria huh? (plus thee yellow curtains) 😭😭🤠

[facemerchant]

that + if you wanna stretch the meaning of an alternate universe then every lovro daydreaming clip applies here too. at least partially

[facemerchant]

so it turns out that sram did have the parallel universe talk after all. huh.

[facemerchant]

when i show up at the ball competition to find that all the balls have been stolen and juggled by @blorbotown

[facemerchant]

so it turns out that sram did have the parallel universe talk after all. huh.